This data is experimental, see the ‘Access Constraints or User Limitations’ section for more details. This dataset has been generalised to 10 metre resolution where it is still but the space needed for downloads will be improved.

A set of UK wide estimated travel area geometries (isochrones), from Output Area (across England, Scotland, and Wales) and Small Area (across Northern Ireland) population-weighted centroids. The modes used in the isochrone calculations are limited to public transport and walking. Generated using Open Trip Planner routing software in combination with Open Street Maps and open public transport schedule data (UK and Ireland).

The geometries provide an estimate of reachable areas by public transport and on foot between 7:15am and 9:15am for a range of maximum travel durations (15, 30, 45 and 60 minutes). For England, Scotland and Wales, these estimates were generated using public transport schedule data for Tuesday 15th November 2022. For Northern Ireland, the date used is Tuesday 6th December 2022.

The data is made available as a set of ESRI shape files, in .zip format. This corresponds to a total of 18 files; one for Northern Ireland, one for Wales, twelve for England (one per English region, where London, South East and North West have been split into two files each) and four for Scotland (one per NUTS2 region, where the ‘North-East’ and ‘Highlands and Islands’ have been combined into one shape file, and South West Scotland has been split into two files).

The shape files contain the following attributes. For further details, see the ‘Access Constraints or User Limitations’ section:

Access constraints or user limitations.

These data are experimental and will potentially have a wider degree of uncertainty. They remain subject to testing of quality, volatility, and ability to meet user needs. The methodologies used to generate them are still subject to modification and further evaluation.

These experimental data have been published with specific caveats outlined in this section. The data are shared with the analytical community with the purpose of benefitting from the community's scrutiny and in improving the quality and demand of potential future releases. There may be potential modification following user feedback on both its quality and suitability.

For England and Wales, where possible, the latest census 2021 Output Area population weighted centroids were used as the starting point from which isochrones were calculated.

For Northern Ireland, 2011 Small Area population weighted centroids were used as the starting point from which isochrones were calculated. Small Areas and Output Areas contain a similar number of households within their boundaries. 2011 data was used because this was the most up-to-date data available at the time of generating this dataset. Population weighted centroids for Northern Ireland were calculated internally but may be subject to change - in the future we aim to update these data to be consistent with Census 2021 across the UK.

For Scotland, 2011 Output Area population-weighted centroids were used as the starting point from which isochrones were calculated. 2011 data was used because this was the most up-to-date data available at the time of work.

The data for England, Scotland and Wales are released with the projection EPSG:27700 (British National Grid).

The data for Northern Ireland are released with the projection EPSG:29902 (Irish Grid).

The modes used in the isochrone calculations are limited to public transport and walking. Other modes were not considered when generating this data.

A maximum value of 1.5 kilometres walking distance was used when generating isochrones. This approximately represents typical walking distances during a commute (based on Department for Transport/Labour Force Survey data and Travel Survey for Northern Ireland technical reports).

When generating Northern Ireland data, public transport schedule data for both Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland were used.

Isochrone geometries and calculated areas are subject to public transport schedule data accuracy, Open Trip Planner routing methods and Open Street Map accuracy. The location of the population-weighted centroid can also influence the validity of the isochrones, when this falls on land which is not possible or is difficult to traverse (e.g., private land and very remote locations).

The Northern Ireland public transport data were collated from several files, and as such required additional pre-processing. Location data are missing for two bus stops. Some services run by local public transport providers may also be missing. However, the missing data should have limited impact on the isochrone output. Due to the availability of Northern Ireland public transport data, the isochrones for Northern Ireland were calculated on a comparable but slight later date of 6th December 2022. Any potential future releases are likely to contained aligned dates between all four regions of the UK.

In cases where isochrones are not calculable from the population-weighted centroid, or when the calculated isochrones are unrealistically small, the nearest Open Street Map ‘highway’ node is used as an alternative starting point. If this then fails to yield a result, the nearest public transport stop is used as the isochrone origin. If this also fails to yield a result, the geometry will be ‘None’ and the ‘iso_hectar’ will be set to zero. The following information shows a further breakdown of the isochrone types for the UK as a whole:

from_centroid: 99.8844%

from_node: 0.0332%

from_stop: 0.0734%

no_trip_found: 0.0090%

The term ‘unrealistically small’ in the point above refers to outlier isochrones with a significantly smaller area when compared with both their neighbouring Output/Small Areas and the entire regional distribution. These reflect a very small fraction of circumstances whereby the isochrone extent was impacted by the centroid location and/or how Open Trip Planner handled them (e.g. remote location, private roads and/or no means of traversing the land). Analysis showed these outliers were consistently below 100 hectares for 60-minute isochrones. Therefore, In these cases, the isochrone point of origin was adjusted to the nearest node or stop, as outlined above.

During the quality assurance checks, the extent of the isochrones was observed to be in good agreement with other routing software and within the limitations stated within this section. Additionally, the use of nearest node, nearest stop, and correction of ‘unrealistically small areas’ was implemented in a small fraction of cases only. This culminates in no data being available for 8 out of 239,768 Output/Small Areas.

Data is only available in ESRI shape file format (.zip) at this release.

Attribute	Description
OA21CD or SA2011 or OA11CD	England and Wales: The 2021 Output Area code. Northern Ireland: The 2011 Small Area code. Scotland: The 2011 Output Area code.
centre_lat	The population-weighted centroid latitude.
centre_lon	The population-weighted centroid longitude.
node_lat	The latitude of the nearest Open Street Map “highway” node to the population-weighted centroid.
node_lon	The longitude of the nearest Open Street Map “highway” node to the population-weighted centroid.
node_dist	The distance, in meters, between the population-weighted centroid and the nearest Open Street Map “highway” node.
stop_lat	The latitude of the nearest public transport stop to the population-weighted centroid.
stop_lon	The longitude of the nearest public transport stop to the population-weighted centroid.
stop_dist	The distance, in metres, between the population-weighted centroid and the nearest public transport stop.
centre_in	Binary value (0 or 1), where 1 signifies the population-weighted centroid lies within the Output Area/Small Area boundary. 0 indicates the population-weighted centroid lies outside the boundary.
node_in	Binary value (0 or 1), where 1 signifies the nearest Open Street Map “highway” node lies within the Output Area/Small Area boundary. 0 indicates the nearest Open Street Map node lies outside the boundary.
stop_in	Binary value (0 or 1), where 1 signifies the nearest public transport stop lies within the Output Area/Small Area boundary. 0 indicates the nearest transport stop lies outside the boundary.
iso_cutoff	The maximum travel time, in seconds, to construct the reachable area/isochrone. Values are either 900, 1800, 2700, or 3600 which correspond to 15, 30, 45, and 60 minute limits respectively.
iso_date	The date for which the isochrones were estimated, in YYYY-MM-DD format.
iso_type	The start point from which the estimated isochrone was calculated. Valid values are: from_centroid: calculated using population weighted centroid. from_node: calculated using the nearest Open Street Map “highway” node. from_stop: calculated using the nearest public transport stop. no_trip_found: no isochrone was calculated.
geometry	The isochrone geometry.
iso_hectar	The area of the isochrone, in hectares.